[ForSale-Swap] Re: [Ham-Computers] USB external HDD's FS

[Marvin Match]

On 25 Nov 2008 at 22:22, kd4e wrote:

> I had forgotten all about the MythTV project!  Cool
> Linux-based system.
> 
> I visited the MythTV site and read the 
> docs:http://www.mythtv.org/docs/mythtv-HOWTO-3.html#ss3.1
> 
> They are a little difficult to follow in places.
> 
> If one were to use a laptop and a firewire, pcmcia, or USB 
> hardware interface what would you recommend as a minimum 
> configuration and what device would you recommend as most 
> readily Linux compatible?
> 
> I would be using Puppy Linux 4.11 (or newer when released).
> 
> Note: I dropped forsale-swap at mailman.qth.net since we are 
> now waaaay off topic!  :-)
> 

Yeah, MythTV is way cool. It's like a TIVO on steroids. I've been 
running it for years... 6 years, I think... My family loves it. 
Anyway, I've installed it every way you can imagine, including 
compiling it from sources way back when that was the only way you 
could do it, and on several different distributions running on all 
kinds of hardware.

At this point, "I've been there, done that, and got the T-shirt" and 
the project has matured to the point that there are two dedicated 
distributions. One is MythDora, which is built on Fedora and the 
other is MythBuntu built on Ubuntu. Actually, there's also KnoppMyth, 
built on Knoppix, but I think Knoppix has just about gone away, so 
the first two are probably better choices. If you want to get up-and-
running quickly, use one of these. It's really easy, compared to any 
other installation method. 

If you want to dedicate a weekend (or a week!) and "do it the hard 
way" then the best distro to use is the one you are most familiar 
with. Even then Jarod Wilsons guide http://wilsonet.com is required 
reading. It's a walk-through installing MythTV on Fedora. Jarod 
hasn't updated it since Fedora Core 6 and it's out-of-date, but still 
makes sense out the MythTV documentation... "Oh, so that's what THAT 
means! Now I get it!" A similar write-up is on the MythTV WIKI that 
evolved from Jarod guide, and Jarod points you to the WIKI from his 
site.

If you have a working Firewire source, like a cable box, then just 
about any computer that walks by will work for "standard definition". 
Be advised that even though many cable boxes have a firewire port, 
most of them are not enabled, even though the FCC says they must be, 
and if they are enabled, some are SD only even when recieving HD 
content.

No Firewire? Then you need a TV capture card or device of some sort. 
The easiest to get working is probably one of the Hauppauge PVR-150, 
PVR250 or PVR500 cards in a desktop... at least until Feb 17, 2009! 
Use it if you have it, but don't buy one! Otherwise any of the DTV 
capture cards like pcHDTV-2000, 3000 or 5500, or the cards from 
Technisat, DVICO, there are more. A really neat unit is an "HD 
HomeRun" made by a company called Silicon Dust. This is a little 
stand-alone box with 2 antenna 'F' connectors and an ethernet port. 
Just connect one or two antenae to the two antenna spigots and 
connect its ethernet spigot to your network and MythTV loves it.

On a laptop, the best choice is probably a USB-based DTV capture 
device. Since I don't use a laptop (except as a fronend only), I 
don't have any first-hand knowledge of the USB capture cards. An HD 
HomeRun will work as well. A laptop will work as a front-end, but 
it's not a good choice for a backend, or a combined backend/frontend 
except as an experiment.

The real beauty of running MythTV is that you can seperate the 
capture and storage functions (the backend) from the display and user 
functions (the fronend). Toss together a desktop box made up of old 
computer parts you probably have lying around, add massive disk 
storage, and stuff it into a closet somewhere where nobody can see it 
and nobody will hear it. It takes almost no horsepower to be a 
backend, even to record HDTV.

For a frontend, just about anything that's relatively modern will 
work for SD. For HD, you need all the horsepower you can possibly 
afford... at least until the next generation of video drivers 
matures.

One caveat: You need at least 2 disks in the backend. One for the 
system and the database (20GB is plenty), another (or several) for 
program storage. I've run it with only one disk for years with no 
problems, but others have had database corruption problems out the 
wazoo. Sooner or later this one will bite you, so just use 2 disks in 
the first place. This is one of the reasons that a laptop is not a 
good choice for a combined frontend/backend, except just as a proof-
of-concept. Hmmm... I guess you could add an external (huge) drive 
for media storage. None of the disks need to be screaming-fast, 
unless you go gonzo with 3 or 4 capture devices and 3 or 4 frontends 
running all at once (like me!).

I'd be happy answer questions or to walk anyone through the setup, 
but we're WAAAY off topic for these lists, I think, with the possible 
exception of [Ham-Computers].

One more thing. My own MythTV installation(s):

Backend: Rack-mounted Athlon-64 3200 w/40GB disk for system and 
database, 5-750GB disks in a software RAID array for media storage, 3 
DTV capture cards and 2 SD capture cards (untile Feb 2009). With 5 
capture cards I can record 5 programs all at the same time, but I 
don't remember that ever happening except when I force it to to so 
just to prove it can. It runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for 
months at a time. About the only time it goes offline is to upgrade 
(It happens to be down for an upgrade right now. I'll have it back 
online this weekend).

Then, every other computer in the house (except the one I use as a 
firewall/router) is set up to be a frontend, including my office 
desktop (this computer), my wifes desktop, and my daughters desktop. 
I can also use my laptop as a frontend, but I don't, usually.

Then, there are 2 more computers dedicated to be MythTV frontends 
only. These are in my home theater to drive my projector and in my 
livingroom. 

The whole house is wired with Gigabit copper ethernet, and my family 
can watch 3 recorded (or live) programs at the same time, while the 
backend records 3 more different (or the same) programs. Haven't 
tried more than that at the same time, but I suspect I'd run out of 
disk drive bandwidth if I tried to do more. Anyway there are only 3 
of us, and usually we watch something together rather than 3 
different programs in 3 different rooms.

Marvin
KA7TPH